The whole family is invited to a 45 minute multi-level yoga class on the front lawn from 11:30-12:15. Taught by certified yoga instruction Meldy Hernandez, RN, MPH. Bring your own yoga mat or a large towel. Suggested class donation $10.

* Food *

Food and a raffle ticket $10.

Chef Caryl Zook, local organic chef and friend of the farm will prepare fresh-from-the-farm food, served buffet-style. The Cantankerous Chef Robert Barnum will roast Redland-raised corn from a local family farm at the campfire circle.

* Fundraiser *

Retiring Extension agent Dr. Mary Lamberts is holding a fundraiser for Cesar Contreras, husband of farmers market organizer Melissa Contreras. Mary has donated her delightful collection of vegetable-themed tchotchkes that she has acquired over the course of her career. They’ll be set up on a table with a donations jar. Choose your favorite collectible and please be generous! Cesar has recently been diagnosed with a serious illness and his medical bills are escalating. The family does not have health insurance.

Location:Bee Heaven Farm19000 S.W. 264 St.

Directions:
From southbound on US 1, turn west (right) on Bauer Drive (S.W. 264th St.), and go approximately 5 miles. The farm is 1/3 mile west of Redland Road (S.W. 187th Ave.) on the left side. Look for the farm sign and flags. Please angle park on the swale and walk on in.

Opening one of these fruits is not for the weak of hand or faint of heart. You’ll need a big, sharp knife to pierce the thick skin, and the blade, your hands and the cutting board all need to be thoroughly oiled so the latex sap doesn’t stick.

You can’t just cut open the fruit, peel it and pop it in your mouth. Its white/gray “rags” or connective membranes are inedible in most varieties and need to be removed. The edible part of the fruit looks like a firm yellow pouch, which contains a large oval seed. You can blanch and roast seeds, or boil in brine, to make a snack that has a taste and texture of chestnuts.

Jackfruit seeds can be cooked and eaten.

When it’s ripe, jackfruit has a strong sweet, distinctive aroma, and gives off a good bit of ethylene gas (which can ripen other things in your refrigerator if you’re not careful.) It tastes like a blend of banana, pineapple and vanilla, and has a chewy texture. You can also eat the fruit green or unripe (but be extra careful with the sticky sap, which is greatly reduced when the fruit is fully ripe), and season it like you would curry or chili, or cook it in coconut milk. It said to make for a convincing meat substitute.

Some of the strangest tropical fruits are available during the summer. One of the biggest and most unusual looking is jackfruit. It is as large as a melon or bigger, mostly oval in shape, and has knobby or spiny green skin. The typical size at market is 20 pounds, but they can get as big as 60 to 80 pounds. It’s commonly sold cut in chunks.

Grower Robert Barnum has about 200 jackfruit trees at his Possum Trot Tropical Fruit Nursery, interplanted with other trees on his 40 acre property. We strolled through a section of a dozen tall trees, all loaded with large fruit which varied in shape and size, some smaller and rounder, others more elongated. You can tell when a fruit is ripe because it sounds like a drum when you thump on it. Another clue is that its spines flatten out as it ripens, although that isn’t the best indicator, because some varieties have flatter spines than others. But the best way to tell ripeness is by smell. Ripe jackfruit has a strong aroma and gives off a lot of ethylene gas. If you put a whole ripe fruit in a refrigerator, it will keep ripening, and the whole interior will smell like it.

Opening up a such a large fruit is not a casual undertaking. It requires stamina and patience, and a large sharp knife well coated with vegetable oil. The fruit’s thick rind releases a latex sap when you cut into it, and can gum things up. The edible part of the fruit is the aril, or thick sac of chewy yellow flesh that has an oval, shiny brown seed inside. The grayish-colored connective membranes called rags are generally not edible and need to be removed. Cleaning the fruit involves taking out the arils, and separating the seeds. Rags and rind are thrown away. Depending on the size, the job can take a good hour or more. Cleaned fruit will keep 2-3 weeks in a zipper bag in the refrigerator, or 6 months in the freezer.

An open jackfruit.

Jackfruit vary in the texture of their flesh. Some kinds are soft and wet, suited for making drinks, and others are more firm and dry. Those kinds are more desirable because they can be eaten ripe or unripe. Robert says the ripe fruit tastes like pineapple-banana with hints of vanilla, but I can smell and taste a musky overtone. (Others have told me the flavor reminds them of Juicy Fruit gum.) Unripe fruit is has a chewy texture, and is usually cooked and used as a meat substitute. Jackfruit curry is a popular dish made with unripe fruit, as is fake pulled pork seasoned with BBQ sauce. Seeds are also edible. Robert recommends blanching seeds in boiling salt water three times to remove the astringent flavor, then roasting in the oven. They taste a lot like chestnuts. You can save seeds to grow your own tree, but you’ll have to be patient. It takes anywhere from four to 15 years, depending on the variety, before a jackfruit tree starts to bear fruit.

Fresh pesticide-free macadamia nuts have been available at several farmers markets the last few weeks. Yes, they are locally grown! The green-husked nuts come from Possum Trot Tropical Fruit Nursery, where grower Robert Barnum has about a dozen trees. This summer, Robert managed to harvest about 45 pounds this summer, and fresh nuts should be available for about two more weeks.

Husk splits open by itself when the nut is ripe.

Fresh macadamias don’t look like a nut. They have a green rind or husk that needs to be cut and peeled off. It will split by itself when the nut is ripe. Robert suggests leaving fresh nuts out on the counter for a few days to dry out a bit. When the husk is slightly dry, it is easier to remove. If you have a dehydrator, you can speed up the process. Dry them for a few hours on low heat until the husks split. Use a sharp knife to pare them off.

Underneath the husk is a smooth, dark brown shell that is tough to crack. Dry the husked nuts in the dehydrator again, for two to three days at 100 degrees F. This will dry the nut meat a bit and cause it to pull away from the shell, making it easier to crack. If they crack cleanly, they’re ready.

Tap the hammer lightly to crack the shell.

Robert’s cracking technique is very DIY. He carefully holds the nut in place on the side of a sledgehammer, and taps it with a claw hammer. If you don’t have two hammers (or don’t want to risk smashing your fingers), you can try a concrete slab or sidewalk and tap at the shells until they crack. (Whatever you do, do NOT do this on a granite counter top or the stone will crack. Don’t say I didn’t warn you!) Nutcrackers don’t apply enough force to crack the shell.

Shelled raw macadamia. It tastes like coconut.

Once the shell is cracked, you have to pry it open. Robert used a pocketknife. Inside is the white, mild flavored nut. You can eat it raw, or lightly toast and salt it. Cracking nuts and getting the meat out is labor intensive, but somehow squirrels are able to open nuts without any tools.

What squirrels leave behind.

The macadamia trees have been bearing well in past summers, but those harvests were much smaller because of The Squirrel Problem. Sounds like a well-worn cliche, but Robert has been battling squirrels for years, trying to keep them out of the nut trees. The little animals have a powerful attraction for macadamias, but waste a lot. They’ll eat part of the nut, cracking it open with their powerful jaws, and let the rest of it fall to the ground.

On a recent visit to the macadamias, two mutts that accompanied Robert and me went racing ahead, barking excitedly. A brown hound ran up to a tree, clambered up its lower branches, barking vigorously. It had spotted something. As Robert and I approached, the dog climbed down. I peered up at higher branches but saw nothing. “Squirrel,” Robert said. “The little critter is hard to spot. It will hide on the opposite side of a branch, and all you’ll see is the tip of its tail, or an eye peeking out.” I did see plenty of half-eaten nuts in the leaf litter below, a sign that squirrels had been munching there for some time.

Feast like a squirrel! Fresh pesticide-free macadamia nuts are available at the Upper East Side Farmers Market, Verde Gardens Farmers Market, and through Bee Heaven Farm’s online store for a limited time.

Convert your gas grill to burn wood. That’s the first of a series of survival workshops that grower/chef Robert Barnum is teaching. “I teach long lost trades, arts, and skills that can be quite useful if the situation becomes less than what it is today,” he said. Robert has teamed up with Jason Long, who started the Re-skill Florida school “where anyone can teach and learn honorable useful skills,” according to their web site.

Bring your gas grill to the workshop and Robert will show you how to safely modify it. Instead of expensive gas, burn wood, and use your own. Being able to cook with wood can save money, and teach you how to be more frugal and self-reliant. Robert has plenty of experience when it comes to being self-reliant. Over the years, he has experimented with which woods are better for cooking, and which are to be avoided. “Don’t use Brazilian pepper, oleander or mango,” he suggested, “as the smoke can be irritating to some people.” He should know — he has 40 acres of trees on his Possum Trot Tropical Fruit Nursery.

There’s room for 35 people, but hurry as the class is selling out. The cost if the workshop is $50. It includes the registration fee, instructor fee, grill modification fee, and lunch. You could try to register online at the Re-skill Florida web site, but when I checked on Wednesday night, the registration button was still not working.

Instead, call Robert at 305-235-1768 to let him know you’re coming, and bring cash to pay at the door. If you haven’t been to Possum Trot before, you will need directions, as the entrance is a bit tricky to find, and the address doesn’t show up on some GPSs.

The gas-to-wood grill workshop is the first of a series of Saturday classes. Coming up:

Feb. 11th — Rope making with Agave
How to make rope from agave plants. Optional: Learn preparation, and camp out the night before.

Feb. 18th — Introduction to economic botany
Learn which trees and plants to grow in your yard for food and other useful purposes.

Feb. 25th — Kitchen frugality
What to do with all the food in your CSA box, and how to shop in bulk and store food.

Have you signed up for any of the sessions scheduled before the Community Food Summit? There’s plenty to choose from. The one that caught my eye is the Regenerative Farm Tour on Sunday Oct. 2. Regenerating is a good thing to do on a weekend, to clear out big city craziness at various farms, big and small, both urban and rural.

Included is a stop at Possum Trot Tropical Fruit Nursery, where Robert Barnum, the Cantankerous Chef, will prepare a delicious vegetarian lunch. He’s using as much farm raised and local food as possible. The menu includes:

The choice is not local or organic but how, through your organic food purchases, you can incorporate supporting local agriculture, local communities and and local economies into an organic lifestyle. The more you were into local culture, the more important it is to support organics in your region.
– George Siemon, Organic Valley

Carolann and Ted Baldyga, Hani Khouri

As the locavore dinner unfolded I couldn’t help thinking that maybe this was the way previous generations ate in this area. Crab, wild pig, cobia, coconut for sure, and other foods were later introduced. Many tropical things, whether native or introduced, don’t grow in more northern latitudes. Jaboticaba, bignay, betel leaf, callaloo, Red Ceylon peach, rangpur lime, Mysore raspberries — you’re not going to find most of those at a supermarket in Miami — or New Jersey! (But you can find some things at farmers markets, or grow others in your back yard.)

James and Donna Patrick, Laura Veitia

Earth Dinner calls for us to honor the earth, the very dirt we stand on, by honoring our food. And by so doing, we honor our farmers — a stubborn, determined, independent tribe — who work very hard to feed us. In fact most of the growers who provided the ingredients for our dinner were present — Robert Barnum, Margie Pikarsky, Hani Khouri, George Figueroa, Teena Borek, and guests Thi and Bill Squire representing our local Slow Food Miami chapter.

Bill and Thi Squire

Robert and Margie’s Earth Dinner was only one of two in the entire state of Florida. I’m a bit surprised there weren’t more. A wide range of food grows in the spaces outside urban development, and agriculture is the state’s second largest source of revenue. City dwellers are quick to forget that they live among farmers, even as farmers are pushed back by relentless waves of development.

Robin and Carol Faber

Margie stood up and spoke at the close of dinner. “This dinner is about the importance of the local farmer. It’s important that we support the local foodshed and the richness of the local food here. This is the way to keep our country strong and our food safe. By keeping food regional, it’s easier to control food safety.”

Anthony Rodriguez, George Figueroa, Tina Trescone

Know where your food comes from, or how it was grown and processed. Connect the food with the place where you live, and you will be healthier and stronger for it. At last month’s Earth Dinner, the taste of this place was in the food and drink. It was unlike any dinner I’d eaten anywhere else. And it sure made for good experience and good memories! If I were to savor a perfectly ripe Mysore raspberry or take a sip of bignay wine, blindfolded, years from now, I would remember in a heartbeat this dinner and this particular abundant land — thanks to our local farmers!